The Browns’ 2008 season had just ended when owner Randy Lerner summoned 15 media people into a conference room.

Very infrequently, Lerner invited a single reporter into his private office for a one-on-one interview. In the five-plus years after his father died, though, he had never invited a media group upstairs.

Lerner was charming and informative as he got into the session. At one point, Cleveland media icon Dan Coughlin told Lerner it was a shame he didn’t do this more often.

At another point, Lerner excused himself, seeming excited, after news passed into the room that the Jets had fired Eric Mangini.

Lerner was excited over Mangini partly because his availability offset his disappointment that he could not get to Bill Cowher.

Lerner gathered himself and resumed talking about the coach search. Shortly after dismissing Romeo Crennel, Lerner explained, he had met with Cowher for dinner in New York. Lerner said Cowher was friendly and interesting but also emphatic about not returning to coaching after sitting out the 2007 and 2008 seasons.

The 2009 Browns went forward with Mangini, not Cowher. Lerner never conducted another group meeting with the media. Cowher never returned to coaching.

For those who would like to see Cowher return now, as the head coach of the Browns, the silence is deafening.

That doesn’t mean Cowher isn’t being chased. New owner Jimmy Haslam and his new CEO, Joe Banner, began discussing Cowher months ago. That’s a given.

One of two things is in play now relative to Haslam and Cowher. One, Cowher is not being pursued, whether it be by his choice or Haslam’s. Two, Cowher is lurking in the shadows, and both he and the Browns have found a way to keep it a secret.

The only connection between Cowher and the Browns for now is that he talks about them now and then as a CBS analyst. The strongest response to his Browns material during the 2012 season may have come after it sounded as if he had called Brandon Weeden Brandon Wiener.

His record against the Browns as Pittsburgh’s head coach was filet mignon. He won 13 of his last 14 games against them before resigning after the ‘06 season.

Cowher was a rookie on the Browns’ 1980 “Kardiac Kid” team and was on the roster for three years. Later, he coached for the Browns — he was with them for all four of head coach Marty Schottenheimer’s full seasons and would have stayed longer, had not Schottenheimer been pressured out after the 1988 season.

It is getting to have been a long time since Cowher was a head coach. Still, at 55, he is five years younger than Nick Saban. He is six years older than Chip Kelly.

Haslam began the week saying the Browns had no front-runner, and he was not discussing any candidate.

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A Cowher candidacy would be strange for Haslam and for Pittsburgh. For starters, Haslam owned a piece of the Steelers from 2008 until recently.

Whether Steelers president Arthur Rooney II and Haslam ended their partnership with a gentleman’s agreement that Haslam would not pursue Cowher, perhaps only they know.